


Giving Life to the Future

by Merfilly



Category: Transformers: Shattered Glass
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, M/M, Mirror Universe, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-10
Updated: 2011-02-10
Packaged: 2017-10-15 13:43:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/161368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The war is over, and Scrapper has a plan. Hook concurs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Giving Life to the Future

**Author's Note:**

> This is set against the AU "[Dynamics of War](http://double-trouble.dreamwidth.org/4316.html)" but it's basically a Shattered Glass world, and takes place well after the unwritten continuation of that particular story. Set up is basically that the Decepticons have mostly won. (How will be revealed when partner and I write the rest of the story)

::Stop lazing around, slaggers,:: Scrapper sent through his gestalt mates, bringing them up from a well-deserved and too-short recharge. Mixmaster voiced an immediate protest like an overgrown Emberling, rolling over with his Kremzeek toy. That was so Mixy that Scrapper almost felt sorry for going over and running digits along the ticklish lines of Mixy's pedes.

::What...whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?:: Long Haul whined, flopping melodramatically on his front plates, one arm hanging off the recharge berth even as his hip sprawled into Scavenger's space, eliciting a groan.

Hook, at least, sat up, anticipating what was afoot. ::This cycle?:: he asked, excitedly. That was enough to make Bonecrusher roll to one side, looking up first at Hook, then over at Scrapper.

::This cycle!:: Scrapper sent triumphantly. ::All caught up on repairs, on the tasks, and Genius is distracted enough we won't have to worry about him underfoot.:: His affectionate nickname for Megatron's right-hand mech made them all smile a little, even if they knew the cause for the distraction wasn't that much fun.

Mixmaster's optics stuttered online as he leaned up, rubbing his faceplates. ::What have you two been cooking up?::

Scrapper looked positively innocent, and leaned in to push his helm against Mixy's tenderly. ::Not in here.:: His optics darted upward in that reminder of Soundwave's constant presence.

::So we roll,:: Bonecrusher agreed, low frequency of his comm rumbling through them all. Hook had to pet along his partner, an automatic response to that sexy-on-wheels tone. Scrapper decided he'd best put a quick end to the mood building there, as well as the playful shoving on Haul's berth, before they all got too distracted to take advantage of Starscream's distraction.

::Fellas, we ain't got a lot of time to get started, and I'm going to need you all rarin' to go,:: he quickly pointed out to them.

A few more pets and caresses, some good-natured grumbles, and eventually the six were rolling for Polyhex's gates.

::Dudes, where's the party?:: Soundwave asked, still standard procedure, even if they had managed to eliminate two would-be Primes and multiple lieutenants intent on keeping the war alive.

::Going scavenging and hauling out along the surface,:: Scrapper came back with a blithe answer.

::When do we throw the luau for Homecoming?:: the communication master asked.

::Going to be a long while. How about one of us checks in every deca-cycle?:: Hook offered eruditely.

::Major high-fives on the dealio, dudes.::

The Constructicons felt him withdraw from the intrusion into their wavelength, all of them amused by the very strange dialect of the cassette-master. They rolled out for quite some distance before Scrapper and Hook veered, changing their route and putting them on a geo-line for a destination they had avoided for a very, very long time.

::No no no no no!:: Scavenger sent forcefully, stopping dead in his tracks. The others came to rest as they transformed into their root-modes for this discussion, a wave of dissension in their ranks.

"Yes, 'Venge," Scrapper told him. "We gotta."

"But... she was our pride and joy and she's so... broken!" Long Haul wailed.

Hook put a hand on Scrapper, stopping his co-leader from speaking out, and coming to stand between the other five. "Long Haul, yes, she is. She saw the beginning of the war, the opening salvo for us, as it was our reason to defect from the government and go to Megatron. It was the clear signal to all of the fliers that they were to be hunted down and exterminated if Optronix got his way." Hook looked at Scavenger. "Brother, apply your logic to the symbol our own people need most. The reward to those who flew and made up the bulk of the effort to turn the war for Megatron's goals. Imagine, for just one shining moment, how her brilliance can gleam once more under the skies and beckon those students who wish to learn the arts and sciences once more on the hallowed ground of a University without peer? Let Crystal City arise once more, a beginning made once more, to signal the end of all her destruction wrought!"

His words faded into silence, and then Scavenger flipped forward into his vehicular mode. ::Stop wasting time, scrap-heaps,:: he sent gruffly, moved almost to emotional overload at hearing Hook's reasoning.

Even knowing what they faced, even understanding that it had been vorns, that didn't make the eventual arrival at what had once been Crystal City any easier on a single one of them. Each of the six circled out, looking at the ruins from a different perspective, trying to decide just how best to rebuild the shining dream.

As they thought, the gestalt link flowed with ideas, building the concept, a simultaneous program of architecture and art. Scrapper opened himself to the full idea, providing the processor space to host the modeling program, letting his brethren feed the dream to him, until they could at last agree on the overall design.

`~`~`~`~`

It had been a very, very long time in the making. Debris had been moved, given to Mixmaster, and extruded back into useful materials. They had come to the site multiple times, always when Starscream was tied down with his workload, and few other Seekers could have brought themselves to fly over this part of the world.

None of them wanted the scientist to be wracked by guilt for not helping in the effort, but they all knew just what it cost him to even think about the city he had seen destroyed for choosing to stand up to Optronix. They had freely used his power grid designs, improving on it as best they could, having that luxury as they had built from the ground up. Each one individually, and Devastator as a whole when his power was needed, had poured energon upon energon into the rebuilding.

Now, the six Constructicons, last of their class unless the Autobots Hoist and Grapple and any others that had turned could be swayed to see reason, gathered in the center of the city, where they had placed the University this time. It would never again be vulnerable, as the city was imbued with cautions learned by war. Shields and defenses were augmented by weaponry, though none of it was outwardly evident, all of it hidden behind crystalline focal devices and gleaming facades. A new garden of the crystal plants had been started; the material that made up the city was all synthetic, but Mixmaster had done a beauty of a job in the synthesis.

"She's whole, on the outside," Scrapper said, quietly, because all of them were feeling the awe of having been able to create so fully again. The other five turned, looking at him, as they heard what went unsaid. Hook had not anticipated this, but he considered his co-leader's intent, and nodded sagely.

"If we did, she truly would be our Creation in all manners," Hook opined.

"And she'd have the ability to guard her denizens," Bonecrusher added, catching the gist, pressing closer to Hook, reaching out for Scavenger.

"We'll do it," Long Haul offered. "All of us, giving what we can."

"No other way," Mixmaster agreed.

Scavenger looked to the vaulted ceilings, out to the light capturing and reflecting walls, then nodded. "We do this." He came close to his brethren, losing himself in the link between them as they did what they had never tried before.

`~`~`~`~`

Every trine, duo, and quaterne turned out to the call of the Constructicons, curiously weakened in their transmission. Megatron, honorary flier that he was, came as well, curious because even as weak as the call was, their had been joy and pride in the sending. Then, as Soundwave flashed up the map of origin for the call, the mathematician began to suspect what they had been doing with all of their time on the surface, away from Polyhex, between missions.

The flights landed, though, in shocked awe, at seeing the newly created Crystal City rising proudly above the plains. None wanted to get too close, and it took Devastator emerging from beside one of the taller towers to make it truly real in any of their processors.

"Starscream," the gestalt called in his gentle voice, a perfect blending of the tones of each mech that was part of the merge. "As the last to see the glory of the last city we built and nurtured, will you be the first of your kind to enter New Crystal City?"

"I..."

"He will." Megatron gave his right-hand a gentle push to make him close the distance. The flier stumbled a bit, then took to his heel-thrusters to clear the last bit of the city's surrounding plains, feeling the tingle of a faint field when he crossed the boundary. While that was curious in itself, Starscream did not place it until he grew much closer to the city proper. Where he had expected silence, other than the ghosts of memories, he was aware of a pressure, the faintest caress of a comm band already active within the city, and it was not coming from Devastator.

Starscream's gasp echoed along the shared communications of the flight awaiting the results of his explorations, and that broke their patience. They milled forward, tentatively entering the shining city, while Megatron went directly to the large gestalt, allowing Devastator to pick him up rather than flying up in his face.

"You did this for them?" Megatron questioned.

"Not just them. Cybertron." The gestalt's optics glowed a gentle blue, gazing down as more and more of the fliers spilled through the air, onto the streets, into the buildings designed for their wings and cones. "Can you hear the city, Megatron? She has called to her companions, but does she call to you with her song?"

Startled, Megatron listened, and he too found that band opening, crooning softly with a simple, loving melody that touched his memories. He sharpened his focus, and looked at the city as a whole, sensing its energy fields, looking and seeing that the city was one composite whole, bound by the woven energies of life itself.

"New Crystal City will never be defenseless," Devastator rumbled. "She will guard her own."

"She lives..." Megatron said in awe. "But there is no Undercity here."

"No... she is frame built, and Kindled by her makers," the gestalt said, that fatigue so evident in the voice again. Megatron peered at Devastator, understanding, and then stepped into air to lower himself back to the ground.

"Rest, my honored friends," he said, as the gestalt team released one another, becoming six familiar...but inert...forms. The leader of the free Decepticons took the time to gently carry each of them to a nearby residential tower, the very one Devastator had hid behind as the fliers approached, and was unsurprised when the building lit and led him via glowing sphere to a chamber with a berth made for six.

Only once Megatron had seen his friends to their resting place did he go, finding Starscream not on the pristinely-scrubbed grounds of the old University as he had anticipated, but standing in the entrance of the new one, dreaming of science and the future rather than the war and their past.

Only as he slid a hand along Starscream's shoulder did the mech turn, showing the grief and healing side by side.

"They gave her such life," the scientist said softly, hearing the unspoken concern. "How could I insult that by remembering destruction?"

"Indeed, Starscream. Indeed."

As they faced the future, six who were one dreamed, held safe by the daughter they had crafted for all hope to reside within.


End file.
